


Sessions

by tristesses



Category: Batman (Movies - Nolan)
Genre: Drugs, F/M, Fear Play, Multiple Personalities, Teacher-Student Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-04
Updated: 2012-01-04
Packaged: 2017-10-28 21:28:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/312357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tristesses/pseuds/tristesses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Harleen attempts to raise her grade, Dr. Crane needs someone to experiment on, and Scarecrow gets sick of waiting around for Jonathan to do something.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sessions

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on 8/17/2008.

She tries to put a gloss over her white-trash roots with nice clothes and a pair of expensive glasses, but Jonathan understands masks rather intimately, and hers does not fool him. Her skirts are too tight, her heels too high, she wears colored undergarments with white blouses – and the lenses of her spectacles are merely plastic. It’s like watching a little girl playing dress-up. Look at me, Mommy, I’m a _professional_ now.

She sets her thesis paper on his desk and slides it over to him, her nails long and polished. Maybe she waits for some acknowledgement from him; she hovers for a moment and when he does not even look at her, she huffs slightly and click-clacks away. Those shoes. Obnoxious.

“Miss Quinzel,” he calls out, once she’s a suitable distance from him. She stops and looks over her shoulder at him, one hand on her hip, a come-hither stare if he ever saw one, but Jonathan does not play these silly games so willingly, like other members of the faculty do.

“I don’t need to tell you that your future in this career depends on the quality of this paper,” he says quietly. “I hope it is up to par.”

Her mask twitches slightly; for just a moment, the real Harleen Quinzel shows through, scheming, crafty, determined, like a magpie after plastic jewels. Then she recovers (a less observant person wouldn’t have noticed her slip-up at all) and smiles at him, red lips pressed together.

“Of course it is, sir,” she says sweetly. “And if it’s not, I’m always glad to rewrite it.”

He arches an eyebrow at her, and says nothing. What is there to say? She’s already had an extension (granted under pressure from her advisor, much to Jonathan’s chagrin) and she’s well aware of how lucky she is. So she walks out, hips swaying, although Jonathan doesn’t notice this. He’s more concerned with that flicker in her face, the girl behind the mask. It would be quite an experiment to see how that hidden girl responded to some simple psychological scare tactics.

-

Of course, his scientific interest becomes less so as he reads her paper. He knows her reputation – there’s no way a girl as sublimely stupid as she could have ascended far enough in university to reach his class without sleeping with a professor or two – but had hoped (optimistically, foolishly) that she would at least be clever enough to get one of them to write her paper for her. Sadly, it’s painfully mediocre, and there are few things Jonathan dislikes more than shameless stupidity. Each stroke of his red grading pen (incorrect grammar, no citation, inaccurate statements) merely solidifies his desire to tear her to pieces. Metaphorically, of course. Any literal wounds will be self-inflicted.

He sends a terse note to her advisor (“Ms. Quinzel’s paper is lacking in both style and substance. A conference is requested”) while the students for his next class trickle in. They’re young, first-year students, and he unsettles them. He’s too serious, by far, but that’s only because they can never tell when he’s joking. And that amuses him. They answer questions and take notes diligently but the undercurrent of fear in the classroom never ceases. There’s a gun in his desk drawer; he’s considering using it, seeing how they react when faced with _real_ fear.

Twenty minutes into his lecture, Quinzel’s advisor replies; he and his winsome student are to have a meeting at six. Ah, a rendezvous by twilight; it’s almost romantic, except most romance stories don’t involve a few potent hallucinogens and a descent into madness.

-

This is worrisome, to say the least. Professor Crane’s always been a bit intimidating but Harleen never expected him to be _mean_ like this. She knows her paper wasn’t that great, she _knows_ , but can’t a guy give a girl a break once in a while? Instead he watches her, blue eyes cold. He reminds her of a snake, slim and calculating and cruel. And he doesn’t talk, even though he’s the one who called the meeting. Trying to throw off, make her uneasy. She’s on to his game, though, and has a few tricks of her own to play. After all, a guy like him…he probably didn’t have many dates in high school.

“Was there something wrong with my paper, professor?” she asks, widening her eyes and looking prettily innocent. It’s an act she’s good at. She crosses her legs, and is slightly disappointed when his eyes don’t follow her sliding hemline.

“Do you think there was something wrong with your paper?” he retorts, and she thinks he’s mocking that slight Midwest accent she still has, however hard she tries to lose it.

“Well, I…” she falters. “I don’t know. Was there?”

“It was pathetic,” he says, biting off the ends of his words like they’re particularly repugnant in his mouth. “I would be surprised if you were actually awake during my classes, given the grasp of concepts you have.”

Harleen stares at him a moment, feeling slightly murderous, then makes a little sobbing noise in the back of her throat and lowers her head. Her light hair, out of its usual tight bun, falls over her shoulders and hides her face; she uses the moment to surreptitiously unclasp the top three buttons of her blouse.

“I’m sorry, sir,” she whispers, keeping her head down. “It’s just that I’ve been having such a hard time lately, with my mother dying and all…” This is a lie, but she’s gambling on his detachment from his students to make him not realize it. “I don’t know what I’m doing half the time…I can’t concentrate…I’m just so upset…”

She looks up at him, leaning forward, lips pouting, and is pleased to note his eyes flickering to her cleavage, and the way he swallows once, harshly.

“If there’s anything I can do to help change my grade,” she says huskily, licking her lips, “I’ll be happy to do it.” A pause. “ _Anything_.”

Harleen rises, and walks around the desk to stand before him. He swivels his chair to face her, and she kneels between his legs. He stares at her, lips slightly parted, like he’s not sure what she’s doing there. She places her hands on his thighs, lightly caressing, and when he doesn’t move, reaches for his belt buckle.

Crane reaches for her, and tangles one hand in her hair. She expects him to pull her closer, lose control, but instead he pulls her head sharply back, making her flinch, eyes watering with the sudden pain. There’s a small smile on his face now, but that doesn’t soothe Harleen one bit. She saw it in class every now and then, usually when he’d said something to make them collectively shudder. The psychology of fear. She’s beginning to understand it, now.

“Your mother didn’t die, Harleen,” he says evenly, and when she opens her mouth to talk he jerks on her hair again, startling a whimper out of her throat. “You have no excuse but your own ineptitude. And you can’t expect to make the grade using your mouth and hands, no matter how talented you are.”

Ugh. So very few people actually demand her body; they’re usually content with her clever tongue and dexterous hands, and she’s gotten a bit spoiled. But she can do it; at least Professor Crane isn’t old, fat, and ugly, like some people (her advisor) were.

“All right,” she says, and is proud of how husky her voice is. She’s always been a natural seductress. “Whatever you want, professor. I can do it.”

He lets her go, and this time, when she steps forward to straddle him in his office chair, he takes her by the waist and pulls her to him.

His kiss is harsh and biting, and his grip on her hips will probably leave bruises later, but Harleen doesn’t mind that little sadistic streak (likes it, actually), and who’s to say a girl can’t mix work and play every once in a while? So she opens her mouth to him, arches her hips to push _just so_ against his, and when he slides his hand up her blouse, cold fingers raising goosebumps on her stomach before he cups her breast and rubs her nipple through her bra, she moans, and it’s not fake at all.

Crane is shaking slightly; she can see his hands quiver when he takes off his glasses, folding them neatly and placing them in a desk drawer. She’s exhilarated; the control is half the reason she does this, to reduce the strong and disciplined into shivering lustful piles of hormones, all because of her. And the grade, of course, that helps too.

She raises herself off of him and steps out of her shoes, then jumps up on his desk, breathing deeply, blouse untucked and unbuttoned, skirt riding up around her waist, bite marks on her jaw and neck. Her lips are swollen from his kisses (and bites) but she smirks at him anyway; she has him in the palm of her hand. Almost literally.

“Well, professor?” she says, and has to bite back a giggle. “How’s my grasp of concepts now?”

He runs a hand through his hair, still looking shaky and uncertain, and exhales slowly. For a moment, he closes his eyes; he’s obviously straining against his fastidiously pressed trousers, and Harleen can’t figure out why he’s not _doing_ anything. And then, he looks at her, and that expression of uncertainty is gone, gone, gone, replaced by an almost clinical stare and a disorienting sort of _amusement_.

“Would you like to help me with an experiment?” he asks, quietly and evenly, a tiny smile on his face, like he’s in on a joke she doesn’t know about.

“I…” Harleen doesn’t like where this is going, but she doesn’t know why; it’s just a niggling sense of not-quite-right, and her grasp on the situation is quickly sliding through her fingers.

“Good girl,” he says, and bends over, taking a slim briefcase out from under his desk, as well as what looks like the kind of medical mask anesthesiologists use to put patients under.

“Professor, what are you – ” she starts, fear prickling under her eyelids, but he cuts her off, shushing her, opening the briefcase so she can’t see what he’s doing behind it.

“It’s just an experiment,” he tells her, “a pet project of mine. I’ve been working on it for years now.”

When she sees the aerosol canister, when she sees him screwing it into the tube attached to the gas mask, a scream wells up in her throat. Fear makes her muscles go rigid, and instead of shrieking like she wants to she just whimpers.

“Please don’t,” she moans, “please don’t, please don’t, please don’t – ”

“It won’t hurt,” he says soothingly, then pauses. “At least, not physically.”

Crane reaches for her, and it’s this first physical threat that knocks her out of her fearful catatonia. She flails and skitters back across the desk, sending his carefully organized papers flying, and smacks his head hard with her knee. He hisses in pain, shuts his eyes for a moment, then grabs her by the ankle and hauls her back.

“It would be much better for you if you weren’t so _difficult_ ,” he snarls, and backhands her as she struggles. The jolt makes her stop moving – she’s not experienced that kind of thudding pain since hitting her head on the uneven bars back when she was a gymnast – and he takes advantage of her momentary pause to jam the mask on her face and make her breathe.

Harleen doesn’t want to but she’s panting rapidly, completely terrified, and as she claws at Crane’s face she inhales his drug. It takes mere seconds to send it percolating through her system, and the effects are instantaneous.

Crane’s face skews and melts; the blue of his eyes gleams and sharpens until it looks like razors wedged into his sockets. Blood trickles down his face into his gaping mouth, which is rank and infested with insects and snakes. And his hands – oh god, his hands, the fingers freakishly long and strong, holding her down, burning welts into her skin and his flesh is – _bubbling_ – the room around them whirls and contorts and twists into a dirty cell, leering eyes peeking out of barred windows and groping laughing scheming –

Harleen screams, and screams, and screams.

-

 _Control_. He almost lost it for a moment, in her lips and scent and soft curves, but he knows what has to be done. Commence with the plan – the experiment. Yes, he must remain professional. Mustn’t let the _other_ gain the upper hand. Professional. Clinical. Find your clipboard, Jonathan. Take notes; observe.

Quinzel lies on his desk, moaning, twitching, eyes glassy, seeing a thousand unnamed horrors emerge from the depths of her childhood nightmares. There are bruises on her legs where he grabbed her; the livid contrast between her skin and the finger-shaped marks make him tremble. His body reacts. He wants to touch her, taste her, (tear her), but that must wait. First things first. Write down the symptoms, and then perform the experiment.

His writing is precise as always; this soothes him, although the other is still poking at his professional exterior. It wants in. He won’t let it. Not yet.

Quinzel’s body jerks, her hands clutching convulsively at the air. A line of spittle trickles from her mouth; it’s disrupting his concentration by being so out of place, so he takes a piece of sterile gauze and dabs at it. She twists her head violently and licks at his fingers, tongue curling almost gracefully, then snaps her jaw closed and emits another screech. The warmth on his hand is a prod in the right direction. He’s finished taking notes; to put this off any longer is to jeopardize the experiment.

She’s a natural blonde, shaved into a neat triangle, and when he presses his hand against her smooth skin she bucks her hips against him. One finger, two, lightly rubbing and stroking; he’s curious what the introduction of the pleasure element will do to her overall state of fear. Then she whimpers and wraps a leg around his hips, arches against him, and he gasps and the other is with him. _Control._

He fumbles with his belt buckle for a moment, but thankfully the other’s there and more competent at this sort of thing; they thrust in and Jonathan emits a slight, strangled moan. Scarecrow is not so weak; he grips Quinzel’s hips and _fucks_ , an unscientific word for an uncouth act. Quinzel is sobbing, although her body is responding; she’s shivering and her nipples are hard. Jonathan sucks at them through the thin silk of her blouse; Scarecrow bites.

When her body convulses, internal muscles contracting, both of them step off the brink and for a moment Jonathan’s not aware of anything but the sensations flooding his senses. It doesn’t last. It never does.

Jonathan picks up his clipboard and pen. Scarecrow taunts him from a corner of the room, but he ignores it; documenting the aftereffects of the experiment is more important than defending his somewhat dubious honor from his lesser half.

There are imprints of teeth across her chest, bruises mostly, but some broke the skin and bled. Jonathan licks his own teeth; the metallic aftertaste lingers in his mouth. Other than that, her condition hasn’t altered much. Perhaps the involuntary movement has ceased somewhat. He notes this on the clipboard, then goes to the briefcase. Thankfully it wasn’t swept to the floor with Quinzel’s flailing.

He takes out a syringe, taps it twice, and injects the woman, movements precise and controlled. The doctor is in again. He watches as her muscles relax, her head lolling off the edge of the desk. It’s a new version of the antidote; it counteracts the direct effects of the toxin but leaves the mental scars and heightened phobias behind. Or so it should; he hasn’t tried it yet.

The clacking of Jonathan’s keyboard welcomes Quinzel back to consciousness; he observes her as she sits up slowly, rubbing her head with one hand, dazedly confused.

“What happened?” she asks eventually, her throat rusty from screaming.

“You fainted,” he replies. “I gave you a mild accelerant to wake you up.” This is untrue, of course, but she’s noticed the puncture in her arm and he has to explain it somehow.

“Oh,” she says, still sounding dazed. “Okay. Professor?”

“Ms. Quinzel.”

“I don’t feel so good.”

He raises his eyes to hers; there’s something new in her face, behind the confusion. Harder, slightly more manic. The experiment looks successful so far.

“You should go home,” he tells her. “I’ll call a taxi for you.” She shakes her head slightly, brow furrowed. “You have a car, then?”

“No, I take the subway.” Her voice is distant, almost dreamy. “Did I pass?”

Jonathan wants to say no, but that’s a vindictive, emotional side of himself he doesn’t entertain. At any rate, to further observe the results of the experiment he’ll have to keep an eye on her. If she passes, she’ll graduate, and then perhaps…there’s always an open position at Arkham. He plans on overseeing the place by then; a mental asylum would give easier access to test subjects than a university.

“Yes,” he says. “You passed.”

She cackles victoriously, then cuts off, looking shocked.

“I don’t – I’m sorry. That was rude,” she stutters, slipping into her shoes, buttoning her blouse.

“It’s nothing, Ms. Quinzel.” She totters off, heels clacking on the floor. He wonders idly if she’ll ever remember their conference.

He swivels in his chair and looks at Scarecrow. Scarecrow looks back, then begins to chuckle.

“You went too far, Johnny boy,” he says cheerfully. “Murder, okay, torture, why not, but rape? Crossed the line, eh, Johnny?”

“Yes,” says Jonathan, “I suppose I did.”

Scarecrow is suddenly closer. Somehow he appears before Jonathan, eye to eye with the psychiatrist. His breath is musty, like old stone and dried straw.

“You know what that means,” he says.

“Yes,” whispers Jonathan. He closes his eyes. An overwhelming feeling of age crashes over him; he is suddenly so, so tired. Anything to get this over with. Anything to sleep.

“Do you accept?” Scarecrow’s voice sounds like skittering claws along stone floors, pecking beaks on wood, feathers cutting through air.

“I do.”

It is a kiss of sorts, a rough cloth kiss, and Jonathan opens his mouth to receive it. It tastes of straw, straw in his throat and scratching down his esophagus, and he gags, but that’s enough, Scarecrow has pushed his way inside. A Scarecrow for the scarecrow boy. How fitting.

Their eyes open. Jonathan can feel the other, so persistent in his efforts to get inside, nestling next to his consciousness in his brain. It’s a curious sensation, having two people in your head. The thought that he might be insane never crosses his mind; this is far too real to be anything but the truth.

Jonathan Crane smiles, and Scarecrow smiles with him. He stands and begins to reorganize his desk, shuffling papers, stacking files. The clipboard he tucks in the briefcase; Quinzel’s file will bear some looking over at home. He takes the gun out of its drawer and loads it, prepares it for firing, then lays it carefully back in its box. His first-year students tomorrow will be very surprised. It’s a fine educational tool.

At home, Harleen Quinzel sits on the edge of her bed and cries. She shudders, but she can’t stop remembering the _things_ crawling on her skin, up her legs. She wants to kill them, something, anything. It’s an unsettling feeling, and it won’t go away until she’s given in, and by then it will be too late; Harleen will have disappeared.

Jonathan and Scarecrow lock the door to his classroom carefully; it wouldn’t do for anyone to break in and interfere with his experiments. The Gotham streets are dim, the hour late; normally he would call a taxi, but he feels almost wild, confident, strong. Tonight, nothing can hurt them.

They whistle as they walk, the two notes blending into one. No one notices.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Sessions](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3071144) by [derivational (crookedspoon)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/crookedspoon/pseuds/derivational)




End file.
